


Ohrwurm, Pt 2 - Soft and Steady Singing

by LyricaXXX (LyricaB)



Series: Ohrwurm [2]
Category: Lewis (TV)
Genre: Community: lewis_challenge, Earworm, International Fanworks Day 2015, Lewis Roulette, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-14
Updated: 2015-02-14
Packaged: 2018-03-12 08:54:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,974
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3350750
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LyricaB/pseuds/LyricaXXX
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“We could...” James’s hands were lying on the table, outside edge down, framing his cup like two parentheses. </p><p>An image of James’s fingers slid into Robbie’s mind. From last night. James’s fingers trailing over his bare skin, leaving sweet, heady warmth in their wake. Robbie shivered. </p><p>“We could pretend it didn’t happen,” James said, and his voice, that sinful baritone that Robbie knew would never leave his head, was low and intense. Thick with...something. Fear? Regret? “Just...go back to yesterday, like last night never happened.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ohrwurm, Pt 2 - Soft and Steady Singing

**Author's Note:**

> Huge thanks to wendymr and xfdryad for beta reading, proofing, and Britpicking. 
> 
>  
> 
> Written for Lewis Roulette 2015 on Lewis_Challenge 
> 
>  
> 
> I tried my luck with Red 19 (for a love song) and received _That’s Amore,_ by Dean Martin, a perfect (if odd) match to my love song prompt, _Folsom Prison Blues._ Like FPB, I would have been happy to never hear this song again. It’s a horrendous earworm of a song and the lyrics are just so cute they make me gag. 
> 
> After spending a day or so whining and moaning to myself about my lousy luck and wondering what I could possibly do with a song with lyrics like ‘When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie,’ I realized that it worked perfectly for the scene I’d envisioned as a sort of epilogue to the Folsom Prison story. And the same as with Pt 1, I’ve had the most fun writing this, though I think the writer of _That’s Amore_ should be smacked up side the head with something considerably bigger and harder than a pizza. 
> 
> I did discover cool new music, though, looking for a less objectionable earworm song to clear this one.

  


* * *

> ...to hear you soft and steady singing  
>                            all those songs  
>  that I have heard you sing before.  
>                     _~Another Sunday,_ Rod McKuen

 

James found him.

Robbie was actually a bit surprised that James hadn’t found him sooner. Or maybe he had. 

Robbie had been preoccupied. Walking and thinking. Pondering. Maybe he just hadn’t noticed James slouching along behind him, blond head bowed in the cool, gray light. 

But, no, he would have felt James if he’d been there, the way he always sensed when James was nearby. Like now. 

James hovered at the edge of the deck, watching Robbie as he sat sprawled on a bench, watching the morning mist as it rose from between the banks of the canal and blanketed the field beyond. 

Robbie turned and smiled. 

Caught, James bit at his bottom lip and tilted his head in that way he had, apologizing wordlessly for lurking. He had Robbie’s anorak clutched in his hands, and he held it out. “I didn’t mean to disturb you,” he said hesitantly. “But you left your coat. I...thought you might be cold.” 

Robbie motioned him forward, realizing for the first time since he’d left the flat that he was a bit chilled. “Thanks,” he said as James draped it over his shoulders. There were stripes of warmth in the cloth, around one arm and on one side of his back, where James’s fingers had been gripping it. 

James nodded and turned to go. 

Robbie stopped him with his voice. “As long as you’re here...”

James turned back, longing evident in the lean lines of his body, in the sudden tension in his shoulders. 

“...get us a coffee, yeah?” 

James nodded, not so downcast as before. 

And Robbie stopped him with his voice again. “James...get us _both_ a coffee. If you want.” 

The brightness of James’s answering smile rivaled the golden light of the sunrise, and he disappeared into the pub. 

Robbie drew the edges of the anorak closer across his chest, thinking maybe they should move inside. Despite the sun coming up, casting a pink and gold glow through the mist, the air felt cooler than it had when he’d started out on his pre-dawn walk. 

James appeared at the door of the pub. “Robbie—” He stopped himself, said, “Robbie...” again as if he were trying it out. Tasting how the name felt, breathed out over his tongue. As if he was using it for the first time, instead of saying a name he’d said hundreds of times. 

Robbie shivered. He understood how James felt. Everything seemed new this morning. Seen fresh, like for the first time. The slow-moving water and the shifting mist. The way the sun felt, warm and gold, on his face. Even the air felt new, as if last night’s rain had washed it. Left it pure and brilliant cold. The only thing that seemed the same, unchanged, was James's voice, pure and warm and sweet.

“Robbie.” James’s voice was stronger and surer this time. “If you want to come inside, there’s a table near the fire...” 

“Reading me mind,” he said and followed James in. The pub seemed dark after the brightness of the dawn sky and pleasantly warm. It smelled of coffee and chocolate and baking bread instead of the usual beer and whiskey. 

Robbie slid the anorak off his shoulders as he followed James to a small, cosy table near the fireplace and tossed it onto the back of his chair before sitting. 

James did the same with his coat. Instead of his usual t-shirt and hoodie, James was wearing jeans and a tatty blue jumper that threatened to unravel with the tug of a thread. It looked so soft and warm that Robbie longed to reach out and scrunch it between his fingers. 

“There’s a special today...Italian hot chocolate and pastry,” James said. “Or would you rather have coffee?” 

Robbie wasn’t sure what Italian hot chocolate entailed. He thought it just meant thicker, but he wasn’t positive. “Hot chocolate, so long as it doesn’t have anything daft in it, like chili peppers.” He paused and thought for a moment. “Though a shot of amaretto wouldn’t go amiss.” It was early to be adding something like that to chocolate, but...what could make hot chocolate more Italian than amaretto? And, besides, it was a special occasion, wasn’t it? 

James smiled. “That sounds good.” And he disappeared again. 

Robbie sat, waiting, soaking up the warmth. His toes and his fingers tingled with returning heat. 

There were a few other early risers in the pub, but no one sitting close. Everyone was spread out instead of clumped around the bar, like usual, or clustered near the hearth like he’d expect on a cold morning. Mostly younger people, couples with their heads close together. Obviously, folks his age were sensible enough to sleep in on a crisp February morning like today. 

But then, he thought, his face warming from more than just the heat of the crackling fire, most folks his age hadn’t wakened next to James either. In James’s bed. 

James returned, balancing cups of frothy hot chocolate, a plate of warm, shiny croissants, and a handful of napkins. 

Robbie helped get the cups on the table as James shifted his chair around so he could settle beside him. Not quite touching, but close enough that Robbie could smell his bright, clean scent. Robbie breathed him in. James sans cigarettes. 

Robbie tasted his chocolate. It was thicker and darker than what he was accustomed to getting in cafes. A bit too hot and saved from being too bitter by the amaretto. It warmed him all the way down. 

His stomach rumbled, reminding him he’d skipped dinner last night. As he reached for a buttered croissant, he remembered _why_ he’d skipped dinner last night. Why there was a cold dish of lasagne languishing in the cold oven, bread still sitting on the worktop, unbuttered. 

It didn’t seem possible that all the images that flared in his head included him. It seemed like it should be some other bloke. Someone he didn’t know. Couldn’t have been him, doing all the things he saw in his mind. Enthusiastically, vocally, responding like that. Lips and fingers and tongues. Soft, smooth skin. James’s honeyed voice. Gasping, strafing pleasure. All those perfect, sensual sensations that James had shown him his body could feel. 

He flushed and put the soft crescent back on the plate. 

Glanced up to see that James was watching him with an intense, penetrating stare that made him feel his soul was being peeled. 

“We could...” James’s hands were lying on the table, outside edge down, framing his cup like parentheses. 

An image of James’s fingers slid into Robbie’s head. From last night. James’s fingers trailing over his bare skin, leaving sweet, heady warmth in their wake. Robbie shivered. 

“We could pretend it didn’t happen,” James said, and his voice, that sinful baritone that Robbie knew would never leave his mind, was low and intense. Thick with...something. Fear? Regret? “Just...go back to yesterday, like last night never happened.” 

James tapped the cup nervously. Drumming with the pads of his fingers. 

Never to hear James whispering his name in pleasure again... Never to feel that excitement, that rush of joy and pleasure... Something empty and yowling opened in Robbie. 

Last night, even before last night, before James had touched him, James had already been in his head. But last night... Last night he’d had all the rest of James to go with the soft and steady singing in his head. James’s hands and his bright, delighted smile and his strong, lean body. James’s heart. And now that Robbie knew what that felt like, to go back to being without it, without James... That’s what it would be like. Howling emptiness. 

“Is that what you want?” he asked, trying to keep his voice neutral. To keep dull regret, sharp fear, from seeping through it. 

“No, it’s not,” James said immediately. “But when I woke up and you were gone, I thought... Maybe...” He stared at the liquid in his cup, refusing to meet Robbie’s gaze. “Maybe it was too much for you?” 

Robbie hunched closer, leaning over the steamy cup, leaning closer to James. So relieved that James didn’t want to erase everything that had happened between them that it felt like music was battering to get out of his chest. 

“I didn’t just go. I left you a note,” Robbie resisted the urge to reach out and stop the nervous tapping. He felt like his heart was matching time to the soft patter of James’s fingertips. “In the kitchen. On the worktop.” 

James tipped his head to the side, staring at his cup, still not meeting Robbie’s gaze. Plainly, he hadn’t found it. “What did it say?” 

“Just that I was going for a walk. That I needed time to think. That I’d be back.” 

James swallowed. Nodded. “I’m sorry. I didn’t see it. I wouldn’t have followed you...” 

Robbie smiled. “Well, you had to. I needed me coat, didn’t I?” 

James’s hands tightened on the cup, finally going silent, but Robbie’s heart continued the thumping patter against the back of his ribs. 

“So...you don’t want to go back? Pretend it didn’t happen?” James asked. 

Despite the initial lurch of fear, receding now, Robbie was charmed by the enigma that was James. Enthralled by the contrast between the sure, seductive James who’d taken him to bed and left him gasping and sated and forever changed, and the hesitant, shy man sitting beside him now. It was overwhelming, to think that James would offer to let him walk away after all that had passed between them. And he smiled, thinking James was a melody whose tempo he’d never be able to predict. 

“James, love... I didn’t need time to think because I want to go back. I needed time to think about how to go forward. With you.” 

James’s head snapped up and he met Robbie’s gaze. 

The sudden flare of joy in his bluegreen eyes took Robbie’s breath away. What he’d been about to say flew right out of his head. In its place, Johnny Cash said, _‘And I ain't seen the sunshine since I don't know when.’_

Robbie couldn’t help but smile, yet again. So overwhelmed, so full of the singing in his heart that he didn’t even care about Johnny Cash singing in his head. 

His hand twitched. His palm itched. He wanted so desperately to touch James. And he couldn’t think of one single reason why he shouldn’t. Not any more. 

He slid his hand over and touched the back of James’s hand. 

James’s fingers uncurled slowly from his cup. 

Robbie shook his head. He should have known James would assume the worst, even if he had seen the note. “Ah, man, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you. I just woke up next to you, and...” 

A swirl of cold swept across the room. 

James turned his hand, palm up, and clasped Robbie’s hand. Said softly, “You woke up next to me and...” But then his voice trailed off he looked up and saw what Robbie had seen. 

The door to the pub was swinging closed behind Jean Innocent. She paused just inside and looked around as if searching for someone. Her gaze swept past them, then returned, and she smiled. 

“Of all the pubs in this town,” Robbie muttered out of the side of his mouth. 

James’s hand twitched in his. 

Robbie held on for a moment. Refusing to let James jerk away. He might not have had a bloody clue how to move forward last night, but the one thing he knew this morning was that he was where he wanted to be. And he wasn’t going to start out by being ashamed of that. 

James met his gaze, and the understanding, the gratitude, that swept over his face was as warm as the fire. He smiled, and Robbie gently, slowly, opened his fingers and let James’s hand go. 

“It’s on her way in to the nick,” James said, looking down so that Innocent couldn’t see what he was saying. “And she told me she likes the breakfast here.” 

Robbie motioned for Innocent to come over. He and James started to rise as she approached, but she waved them back into their seats. 

“Robbie! James! You’re out early.” 

“You, too, Ma’am,” Robbie countered. 

“I’m supposed to be meeting Mr. Innocent for breakfast before I put in a little time at the nick. Hopefully, it’ll be quiet enough I can get some paperwork done.” She turned around to survey the room again, as if there was a possibility she’d somehow missed her husband in the small pub. “He had a very early meeting this morning. I don’t see him here yet.”

“Sit with us until he gets here,” Robbie said. 

Not giving her a chance to decline, James got up and pulled a chair over to their table. “The special today is Italian hot chocolate. Or would you rather have coffee?” 

She put her leather bag in a chair at the table next to them and slipped out of her coat. She was dressed casually in slacks, but her pink blouse was silky and much frillier than anything Robbie had ever seen her wear. Her hair was down, soft and curly around her face. “Thank you, James. The hot chocolate, I think.” 

“With or without a shot of amaretto?” he asked, his eyes crinkling as he grinned over her head at Robbie. 

“Is that what you two have? Goodness, isn’t it a bit early for that?” She peered at his and Robbie’s cups and said brightly, “Though it does sound good. Without, I suppose, since I actually hope to get some work done later.” 

Innocent watched James head off toward the bar, then settled herself in the chair and peered at Robbie with even more interest than she’d given their chocolate. “Is there something you want to tell me, Detective Inspector?” 

Robbie knew exactly what she meant, and he was surprised to realise he didn’t care if she knew. But he didn’t want to say anything without asking James first. He called up a bland expression. “Ma’am?” 

Innocent smiled at him, rolled her eyes a little. In the flickering firelight, her dark eyes were almost as sparkly as James’s. “I could have sworn I saw you and Inspector Hathaway holding hands when I came in.” 

Robbie tried not to be flippant, but the idea that he had the right to sit in a pub and hold James’s hand was too pleasing to contain. Laughter spilled out in his voice. “Ah, that... I had a splinter in me finger, and James was helping me with it.”

“Oh...” Innocent nodded sagely. “Nasty things, splinters. You can’t be too careful. You think there’s nothing much to them, but they’ll work their way right under your skin.” She smiled at Robbie, as innocently as her name, and then smiled up at James as he appeared at her side and deposited a cup of hot chocolate in front of her. 

James slid back into his chair. 

She sipped from her cup. “Oh, this is lovely. A proper Valentine’s Day treat.” 

Robbie started, and he felt James twitch, too. 

Innocent interpreted his expression. “You didn’t realise it’s St Valentine’s Day?” 

Robbie shook his head. 

“I forgot it was today,” James said, but he looked down into his cup to hide the smile that twitched at the corners of his mouth. 

Robbie wished that Innocent wasn’t there so he could ask what James was thinking. Maybe it was the same as what he was thinking...that he’d already received the perfect Valentine treat last night? 

He searched under the napkins for a spoon and stirred his chocolate, applying himself to the task as if it required precision and care. Wouldn’t do to grin like an idiot with Innocent watching. 

“Well, why did you think the pub is doing a hot chocolate and pastry special?” she asked. “Or playing that ridiculous music?” 

Robbie cocked his head and listened. The music was very low key. So much so that he hadn’t noticed it until now. But that might have had something to do with James drumming on his cup and Robbie’s heart drumming on the back of his ribs. And James’s voice singing in his head. 

The music was a bit tinny, but easily heard, once he listened for it. Paul McCartney sang, _‘Some people want to fill the world with silly love songs. What’s wrong with that?’_

Robbie couldn’t help but grin. And think that his face was going to get tired with all the grinning. 

McCartney faded and another song started. Dean Martin, singing _That’s Amore._

Robbie tilted his head to hear better. “I haven’t heard that one in years,” he said. “Me mum used to play it on the turntable.” 

“Don’t listen, Robbie.” The horror in James’s voice was unmistakable. “ _That_ is an annoying earworm of a song.” 

“Bite your tongue, Inspector,” Innocent with in mock horror. “That’s a Dean Martin classic. My mother used to listen to it, too.” 

Robbie laughed aloud. He gripped his cup in both hands to keep from reaching for James’s hand again. Settled for nudging James’s thigh with his knee under the table. “No worry,” he said. “I’ve got the perfect cure for earworms.” 

James grinned and shifted his leg so that he rubbed Robbie’s knee with his knee. 

Innocent looked back and forth between them. “I’m almost afraid to ask, but...earworms?” 

Robbie answered. “You know, a tune that gets stuck in your brain and you can’t get it out.” 

“Ah. I have a friend who complains about that all the time, but she calls it a ‘song loop’. I’ve never had it happen.” She sipped her chocolate. “So what’s the cure?”

James looked at him and raised his eyebrows, gave that straight-lipped smile that dared Robbie to talk his way out of that question. 

Robbie felt a flush rising up from his collar, but he shrugged and pretended nonchalance. “I had one a couple of weeks ago. An annoying country song that wouldn’t get out of me head. It about drove me crazy. And one of James’s mates gave me the perfect cure. A recording of the music his band plays. You know, they do world music with a combination of jazz and—”

“Madrigals,” Innocent supplied. “Yes, I remember you telling me.” 

“Medieval madrigals,” Robbie corrected. 

James smiled, obviously pleased to hear that Robbie had been talking to Innocent about his music. 

“You’ll have to invite me sometimes, James. I’d like to hear—.” She leaned around them to peer at the door. “And there’s Mr. Innocent!” 

They both turned to look at the dark-haired man who’d just stepped into the pub. He scanned the room and raised his hand to wave at her. 

Innocent stood, her chair scraping the wood floor and momentarily drowning out the annoying mandolin trill signalling the end of _That’s Amore._ She paused, smiling down at them as she caught up her coat and bag. “Happy Valentine’s Day, gentlemen!” 

“Ma’am,” they chorused in unison and watched her cross over and tilt her face up for a kiss from Mr. Innocent. 

“One of these days, I'm going to get pissed, liquid courage like, and ask her if she calls him ‘Mr. Innocent’ at home,” Robbie said. It wasn’t the first time he and James had wondered.

James turned back to him. “That didn’t go too badly, considering we were holding hands when she walked in.” 

“Depends on whether you stayed here to face the music, or whether you bolted to get her a cuppa,” Robbie said dryly. 

“I didn’t bolt!” James protested, but he grinned. “I was merely fetching a drink for my superior officer, as I was trained to do by a previous superior officer.”

Robbie jerked his head in Innocent’s direction. “She asked me if there was something I wanted to tell her.” 

James blanched. “What did you say?”

“That I had a splinter in me finger and you were helping me get it out.” 

A burst of laughter escaped James, and he tried to choke it back. 

Robbie grinned and patted him gently on the back, fingers lingering on the soft sweater, tracing the bony protuberance of shoulder blade. He’d discovered last night just how much he liked the feel of James’s strong, square, sharp back under his hands. 

James shivered a little and rolled his shoulders, almost preening under Robbie’s touch. 

“If you want to tell her, I don’t mind. I just didn’t want to speak for you.” Robbie glanced back to see where Innocent and her husband had gone. They were just turning the corner, heading towards the area that overlooked the deck. When she was out of sight, he took James’s hand again. 

James smiled and turned his palm, as he had earlier, so that he could curl his fingers around Robbie’s. He ran his thumb back and forth over Robbie’s knuckles. “Are you sure, Robbie? Being in a relationship with a man, it’s a huge change for you. When I woke up and you were gone, I thought...that maybe you woke up and realised what you’d done. That maybe it was all too much.” 

Robbie smiled, remembering how it had felt last night...James kissing him, touching him. How he'd felt, returning those kisses and caresses. How it had felt to wake in the night and find James snuggled against him in the darkness. It had all been strange and different, but...right. So perfectly right. 

And this morning, lying there watching James sleep... 

“It is a change. But this morning,” Robbie said, “when I woke up next to you, all I thought was that it’s something I want to do every day.” 

James’s cheeks flooded with colour. If his eyes got any more sparkly, Robbie was afraid they would start shooting sparks. 

“It scares me a little, though.” Robbie pushed his cup away and took James’s hand with both of his. He almost couldn’t believe it was him, sitting in a public place, holding hands with James. But it felt so normal... It all just felt so right and natural that he realised he’d clasped James’s hand between his without first glancing to see who might be watching. 

“What scares you?” James clutched his fingers. 

Robbie cleared his throat. “With Laura and me...we decided we were better off as friends—and I’m glad we could stay friends, and not end up like some couples, all bitter and angry—but I don’t want that to happen again. I don’t want you and me to wake up one day and realise we’d be better off as friends. And that’s why I went for a walk. To think it through. To think about how to do it better, this time.” 

“And did you figure it out?” 

“No. I’m afraid I’m no closer to knowing how to do this better than I was before.”

James’s fingers moved between his, stretching wide, then settling to stillness. “But you do want to try?” 

Robbie smiled. “Your voice is singing in me head now, love. There’s no going back from that.” 

James laughed out loud. 

It was the most amazing sound. James Hathaway, laughing. Giddy and happy. Robbie wanted to hear it again and again. Wanted that sound to take up residence in his head and play over and over. 

“Are you calling me an earworm?” James asked, voice light and teasing. 

A sense of warmth flowed through Robbie. Comfort and safety. Excitement, spine-tingling and as exotic as the thick taste of dark chocolate and amaretto. And he laughed. “Oh, aye, Jim. You’re me very own earworm. And I hope never to find a cure.” 

###


End file.
